Ok, it’s an easy mistake to make. You decide to sell on old filing cabinet and you forget to check to see whether you’ve left something in it. Mainly because you’ve lost the key.
Whatever. This just shows why we need the sort of legislation being proposed which would make it a criminal offence for the person buying the cabinet, even before he or she openned it.
Of course, one presumes that ASIO or the AFP wouldn’t be swooping on them until they’d actually opened it because that would suggest that somehow the law enforcement agencies knew what was in the cabinet even before it was passed it on to the ABC. Which would sort of make one wonder how they ever let it leave the building.
I guess the point I’m making is that the cabinet would need to be openned before anyone knew what was in it and that would make it impossible for anyone to tip off the appropriate agency that something with Classified material in it had accidently left the office. Not even someone in Michaelia Cash’s department could tip someone off until they knew the contents of the thing.
Whatever, I’m just pleased that those communists at the ABC would be guilty of an offence as soon as they read the material. I mean, they could claim that there was a national interest in pointing out that they were in possession of a large number of confidential documents but we could throw them all in jail before they had a chance to make that defence, because how could it be in the national interest to have something embarrassing to the Liberal Party in your possession?
Yep, the sort of legislation that the Liberals have in mind makes me feel like my freedoms will be protected. All I have to do is avoid secondhand things. And surely that’s something we should all aspire to.
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I do hope the ABC have followed proper business procedure and copied loads of incriminating documents with which to threaten the LNP ( and Poorline’s One Notion) immediately prior to the Budget season?
a bit of comedy to deflect us from the horror that is our Parliament and the scum that inhabit it
LMFAO
Presser#1.. sorry, just had to point out typo. It’s No Notion.
The stench from this Govt,the ABC ASIO and the AFP is overpowering, and i think it’s time to call in the public fumigators!
Looks like our democracy is being shattered … Oops meant SHAT ON.
…and the circus just got real….incompetence upon incompetence…so glad the “adults are back in charge.”
Hmmmm, really doesn’t seem to add up, does it, Rossleigh?
Something has been planted? To embarrass someone??
What? Who?
Really?? Who sells a full locked filing cabinet? (Almost impossible to move, btw)
Oh, so many questions?
I would be laughing at the ridiculousness, but i suspect there’s a very nasty subtext to this story. (Or what are we being diverted from?)
You might be onto something there amethyst3009. There’s a niggle in the back of my mind as to why these 2 (presumably fully loaded with files) locked cabinets came to be sold off or sent off to the secondhand store without them being checked first. I wouldn’t sell off a cabinet or locked piece of furniture without first checking if anything was inside. I’m still mind boggled about it.
Something does not smell right.These cabinets had documents from 5 different governments and usually cabinet docs are not available to the incoming government but these protocols were broken by Abbott when he gave Rudd’s cabinet docs to RC on home insulation.
Cabinet docs can only perused by the government that created them. On change of government the files should have been archived but we are dealing with Libs here and rules do not apply to them
Does it have anything to do with Godwin Grech or another of turnbull’s or cash’s good buddies?
Yes, this whole episode has a stench about it. Ever moved a loaded two drawer filing cab? Takes a solid trolly to do it. There’s more to this than mere incompetence.
The legal ownership of the papers inside the filing cabinets is an interesting conundrum …. the first owners of the cabinet, the Commonwealth, sold the cabinet AND THE CONTENTS to a third party purchaser for cash without notice who in turn sold on the cabinets to a second third party (final) purchaser for cash without notice, who then gifted to papers to the ABC for no known remuneration.
So any claim to the papers by any government department would appear to very, very, twice remote and likely require court proceedings to recover the documents (there is no interest in the cabinets themselves, against the usual terms of commercial transactions. I cannot see the courts allowing such a blatant breach of commercial law.
So, the alternative would be for the NLP government to expose their fascist intentions using the harsh new anti-journalist laws or “steal” the documents either by ASIO raid (interesting publicity opportunity) or covertly (Watergate anyone?).
Hopefully the ABC will have done a deal whereby the NLP government gives an enforceable written undertaking NOT to bad mouth the ABC between now and the declaration of the next Federal election results, likely to occur after 30 poor poll showings when Peter Dutton and his inhumane refugee policies seeks endorsement from the Australian voters.
Looking the contents, it does appear that it was a LNP ministers cabinet. My guess would be they were in Tony Abbotts office and held by the Senior Dirt File Manager and the mix up occurred when he was deposed.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-31/cabinet-files-reveal-inner-government-decisions/9168442
I think Phil is onto something, filing cabinets full of papers are HEAVY; even I can handle an empty one…
@ Cliff
A most interesting “coincidence” – the oh, so secret documents were a collection from 5 different federal governments conveniently collated within just one cabinet. Also the amazing serendipity that Aunty received the ‘booty’ – imagine if such bounty fell into the Murdoch media?
I’m guessing many possibilities should that have been the case, not the least, we would not have heard anything unflattering about LNP. Also would we even be aware the leaks were from an actual cabinet?
However, that didn’t happen, instead we are facing legislation ensuring “guilty until proven guilty” – the type of legislation that has Dutton written all over it, in spite of the ABC releasing way less than top secrets about both the LNP and Labor. Nothing truly extra-top secret was released (I am hoping every document was read, very thoroughly indeed).
The incessant whiners (the LNP) about the ABC should, perhaps, be grateful it was the ABC and not other media corporations.
However, I’m also betting that unless leaked information has a negative impact on the opposition parties, this whole story will miraculously disappear….
One thing is certain, this is no “mistake”.
Good news was that they also found Malcolm Fraser’s trousers in that filing cabinet !
In case you had forgotten Trousergate :